AASHTO Journal, 27 February 2015
Two new reports are showing that funds made available to states out of the Highway Trust Fund have been slowly declining in recent years, and that inflation-adjusted infrastructure spending is weakening at all government levels.
These come at a time when members of Congress are discussing ways to replenish the trust fund, and as an educational campaign launched by AASHTO urges lawmakers to think in terms of what type of transportation system the country needs.
TymonSome in Congress want to simply extend federal programs at current levels plus inflation, though House Transportation Chairman Bill Shuster told state agency executives Feb. 26 that higher investment levels are needed. Meanwhile, a number of states are acting to bolster their own transportation revenues, or considering new measures.
The new reports are also in line with results of a recent “Bottom Line Report” issued by AASHTO and the American Public Transportation Association, which showed that funding at all levels of government is not keeping pace with investment levels needed to maintain infrastructure quality or growing capacity demands.
The Associated Press conducted its own analysis of federal program spending that found the amount of HTF money going to states fell 3.5 percent for the five years of 2009-2013.
AP bureaus in other states localized the data and used it to report on both state and federal funding levels for surface transportation, and what states are doing to raise their own revenues. In Indiana, for instance, the AP reported that Highway Trust Fund spending fell 5 percent during the five years ending in 2013, at the same time the state’s fuel tax revenue has been declining.
The main AP story also quoted Jim Tymon, AASHTO’s chief operating officer, about the effect on roads and bridges from insufficient funding levels. “A lot of those facilities are in need of really massive rehab, almost reconstruction from the ground up,” he said.
-Calculations and graphic are from the Pew Charitable Trusts.Separately, the Pew Charitable Trusts published updated informational graphics on transportation investment levels, including one showing declines in inflation-adjusted spending at the federal, state and local levels from 2002 to 2012.
The Pew data says federal spending on highways and transit fell from $62 billion in 2002 to an inflation-adjusted $56 billion in 2012 if stimulus projects are included, or to $50 billion if stimulus funds are left out.
During that time, it said, state spending on roads and transit shrank from $105 billion to $89 billion, while local investment levels dropped from $81 to $73 billion.
Pew calculated that average annual federal investments on highway and transit systems amounted to $54 billion for 2008-2012, and were just 25 percent of the total government spending on those sectors. States on average spent $84 billion or 40 percent in that time, Pew said, while local governments picked up $75 billion or 35 percent.